


Where Villains Spend the Weekend

by di0zapeeRc



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Based On A Panic! At The Disco Song, Episode AU: s06e11 The God Complex, Multi, boys' weekend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-20 10:19:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11918817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/di0zapeeRc/pseuds/di0zapeeRc
Summary: Inspired by 'Vegas Lights' and 'The God Complex', the Doctor organises a weekend off for the gang in which Amy and River go to a spa and he and Rory hit Vegas. Soon, however, strange developments have the Doctor utterly stumped as to what to do to save himself and Rory - not only from their devilish captors, but from their own feelings about each other.





	Where Villains Spend the Weekend

“Doctor, are you sure about this?” Amy’s clear voice rings out through the TARDIS control room.

“Sure, Pond? _Sure_? When have you ever known me to be sure of anything?” the Doctor says, throwing a lever on the console.

The TARDIS goes into momentary free-fall. Rory and Amy grab onto whatever is closest, leaving the Doctor to tumble about the place like a fish out of water. This has him remembering the Hath – which makes him remember Donna and Gennie, which, in turn, has him wishing the tumbling would knock him out somehow.

Finding her time-stream, the TARDIS smooths out and they can all find their feet again. Amy smooths out her skirt and Rory trips over his own untied shoelace. With a mumble of “stupid”, Amy has her husband in hand and upright.

“But what about you two?”

“What _about_ us?” the Doctor asks her. “We’ll keep ourselves entertained. Have a boys’ weekend, won’t we, Rory?”

“Uh, yeah! Absolutely! While you girls get massages and martinis, we’ll be having a _boys_ ’…weekend…” he trails off at the look on his wife’s face.

“Yes, well, gross sexism aside, we’ll be fine, Amy. The worst that could happen is Rory could fall down a stray ventilation shaft, but I’m sure I’ve covered them all since last time!” the Doctor says, cheerily.

With a last hollow thumping sound coming from the console, they land. Amy spins around to face the Doctor, a look of protest on her elfin face. It disappears when he produces a brown, leather carry-on from beneath the controls. He stuffs it into her hands, not so much eager to be shot of her, but for her to find some sort of reprieve from the loss of her daughter – with her daughter.

“Mother, Father. Hello, sweetie,” comes her voice like honey dripping into tea.

As always, his cool smirk hides the loud thumping of his hearts in his ears. Somehow, he’s always believed she can hear them, regardless.

“River! Did they let you out for the weekend for good behaviour?” he asks, cheekily.

“Never,” she returns his flirting, over Rory’s shoulder.

The Doctor ambles over to her, knotting and unknotting his fingers nervously. She pulls him to her by the lapel of his coat and their lips meet like neutron stars colliding. His usual initial reserve at kissing River so passionately in front of her parents melts away almost immediately. His one hand finds the small of her back and the other loses itself in her soft curls.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather be spending your weekend together?” Amy asks, as they break apart.

“Oh, nonsense, Mother! This is our weekend! And if anyone asks questions, you tell them you’re dying of time sickness,” River says, matter-of-factly.

“ _Time sickness_?” the Doctor scoffs.

“From prolonged exposure to the TARDIS without protection. It’s alright, I have everything memorised. Just don’t say anything to anyone without me.”

The Doctor smirks again.

Rory fixes his gaze on his daughter.

“Melody, you look after your mother, you hear me? Try not to get in trouble. Every spa weekend doesn’t also have to include recreational monster hunting.”

River sighs. “Yes, Dad. What are you two planning on doing, then?”

“Haven’t decided. Figure I might just let the TARDIS take us where she thinks we’d like to go. I do trust her judgment,” the Doctor rambles, staring at the console adoringly.

Amy makes a gag face that he misses, but River and Rory chuckle and the Doctor turns to glare at them. He ignores it, not really liking being the butt of a joke, but letting it go for the sake of peace.

After more hugs and kisses, the two ladies are off and the TARDIS door locks itself behind them.

“So, are we really going to let the TARDIS decide for us, Doctor?” Rory wants to know, eyeing the console.

The Doctor pins him with a smile and claps his hands together.

“Do you reckon Amy would’ve let us go by ourselves if I’d outright said “Vegas”, Pond?” he asks, a mischievous glint in his eye.

Rory smiles back.

“Probably not. So, Vegas, then?” His excitement is audible.

“Vegas. It’s a rite of passage, if you think about it,” the Doctor says, throwing the TARDIS into gear and setting a course for the best hotel she churns up.

“Absolutely! Absolutely a rite of passage. You have not lived until you’ve spent a weekend you cannot remember in Vegas!” Rory replies, gesticulating wildly.

As the TARDIS charts their course, the Doctor pulls Rory along with him into the wardrobe. He argues that they at least have to look the part if they’re going to fit in with the crowd there. Rory entirely agrees and loses himself amongst the lavish suits and dress shoes.

However, the Doctor seems to have other ideas. When they meet back in the control room, his suit is entirely gone. It has been replaced by torn jeans that almost go up to his mid-waist and is held there by a thin-ish black, leather belt. He has the cuffs at the bottom rolled up and his shoes are high-top, white Converse. His shirt is tucked into his jeans and the already short sleeves are rolled back about twice and the colouring is pale olive and white, broad stripes. The most scandalous are the accessories, though: a gold chain around the neck, knotted, felt bracelets around his wrists and peeking through the holes in the jeans are fishnet stockings.

“Doctor, aren’t those, um, _girls’_ clothes?” Rory asks, feeling awkwardly overdressed in his suit and Italian leather shoes.

“No, they’re _my_ clothes. Well, technically they belong to the TARDIS, but my TARDIS, my clothes,” he explains, clasping his hands together.

Rory blinks twice, but he wasn’t mistaken. The Doctor IS wearing green nail polish.

“Should I, um, go change?” he asks, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, wondering if he could keep these shoes.

The Doctor explains to him how the wardrobe actually works and sends Rory to have himself dressed. He spies the colour on his nails and decides he rather likes it. He might ask Amy for some of the pretty red she’s been wearing, reasoning it would match his one bowtie and pair of braces.

His leg knocks against the edge of the console while he works on parking. A plastic-y clack greets him. Reaching into his pocket, he pulls out a pair of skinny-framed, black, polarized sunglasses.

“Polarized sunglasses are cool,” he mutters to himself, putting them on.

“Better?”

The Doctor turns to Rory and takes in his far more appropriate appearance. Pale pink Capri shorts, brown loafers, a white and light blue, vertically striped button-up and wood-framed sunglasses.

“Much,” is the Doctor’s assessment.

“Are we there yet?” Rory asks, headed for the door.

“We are indeed. I do believe I’ve parked us inside the hotel, though. I reckon I could sonic us a room. You’re not opposed to sharing, are you, Pond?” says the Doctor, not really expecting an answer, as he pushes past Rory and out the TARDIS door. Before locking up, he puts the TARDIS a second out of sync with everything else to keep someone from stumbling inside it accidentally.

The hotel looks like they stepped out into the 80s. For a moment, the Doctor worries that they have – that the TARDIS had got it wrong again or brought them someplace that needed their help. He whips out his sonic screwdriver, sets it for a location and time readout and hits the button. The weird noise stops someone coming up the corridor behind them dead in their tracks. Rory pulls the Doctor out of the way by the hand and the person grins knowingly to themself. The Doctor stares at his hand in Rory’s until Rory lets go.

“So, um, do we just pick a room, or…?” Rory blusters.

“Sure. But pick wisely – I can’t sonic too many of the card readers without the front desk getting a system notification,” the Doctor says, pocketing his sonic for now.

Rory wonders how he’s supposed to “pick wisely” if he can’t see inside the rooms. He mentally shrugs and decides having to share a bed with the Doctor for two nights can’t be so bad, especially since he’s quite certain the Doctor doesn’t sleep.

“This one,” he says, picking a door at random.

The Doctor eyes the number, 11, and grins to himself.

“If you like,” he says and has the door open in three seconds flat.

Scanning the room, something changes. The Doctor’s shoulders grow more and more tense. Rory tries to ignore it, hoping beyond hope this doesn’t mean what he’s dreading it means.

The Doctor, thankfully, says nothing and they dump their bags on the floor. Rory goes to pull open the curtains. This was a mistake. The window beyond shows a mirage-like scene. He can see Amy in an emerald bikini and River in a revealing, black one-piece. He shakes his head and the image distorts for a second, but holds. He reaches to touch the glass, but a deafening rush fills his head and triggers a bout of intense nausea. He yanks his arm back and the rushing and nausea disappear.

“Do–”

“I see it. What is it _you_ see?” The Doctor asks him, stepping up to the window as well.

“Amy…and River. They’re at the spa. Amy’s wearing a green bikini…”

“And River’s wearing a pretty black thing?” the Doctor asks, carefully.

“Yes! Is this some kind of portal?” Rory asks, frowning.

“Not a portal. I would say a perception filter, but I’ve never seen anything like it,” the Doctor says, whipping out his screwdriver again and pointing it at the window.

For a full minute, the room is filled with that odd mixture of buzzing and whining and the frown on the Doctor’s brow deepens and deepens.

““Error”,” he reads. “ _Error_?! _What does that even mean_?”

He smacks the screwdriver against the heel of his hand a couple times and then points it back at the window.

Another minute later: “ERROR. I have never once gotten an error. An “unknown”, sure, but not a bloody error!”

“What now?” Rory wants to know.

“I have no idea what this window is and it’s managing to short out my screwdriver. This is, however, a weekend intended for relaxation!”

“So, we’re just going to ignore the window?”

“What window?” the Doctor asks, halfway out the door.

Rory smirks and follows.

They wait for the lift in a corridor that seems to stretch on forever. To their left, a guy not looking that much older than Rory himself and a girl not looking that much older than sixteen come stumbling toward them. She trips over her sky-high heels, but he steadies her by pulling on the hand of hers he’s holding. Rory looks away as he sees the innumerable red spots dotting her arm. He notices the Doctor looking, too, and frowning. He checks his watch and then takes Rory’s hand again and lifts it to his face. He keeps it there as they enter the lift.

“Something the matter?” Rory asks, quietly.

The Doctor stares at Rory’s watch for another moment and then pushes his hand away.

“Absolutely not.”

Rory asks the Doctor where they’re headed now. He responds that this hotel is also a casino and that they might do some light gambling and some heavy drinking. Rory chuckles to himself. The Doctor looks distracted. Rory notes to himself that he looks distracted about being distracted and is about to turn to make that comment to Amy, but then remembers the current situation.

 _It’s how much I love her_ , he says to himself and entirely rejects the notion of it sounding sappy.

“I like your look,” the girl says to the Doctor, eyeing either his jeans or his fishnets. Rory can’t tell.

“Thanks,” the Doctor says in a perfect American accent, eyes on her pockmarked arm. “Pro-tip: quit the junk. I hear that shit kills.”

The door opens and they spill out.

Still with the slight frown on his face, the Doctor takes point in leading them to the casino. Something about this hotel doesn’t make sense to him. Obviously, it started with what happened upstairs, but… what happened again? He’s not even drunk yet and he can’t remember. Maybe it’s because he was so determined to forget. He shakes the uncharacteristic cobwebs from his head and focuses on the task at hand: getting them drinks.

Walking across the threshold into the casino is probably the last coherent thought Rory has for the night. The drinks seem to appear as if by magic. So many new flavours and textures, so many new people and sounds, so many blurry encounters and so much laughter. Rory doesn’t think he’s ever laughed this much or ever seen the Doctor laugh this much. People seem to be calling him Matt. Rory wonders where in the hell they got that, but doesn’t say anything out loud except to ask “Matt” if he’d like another drink in his best American accent.

“Rory, you absolute doll. I’d LOVE another drink,” is his response.

“Is this your…hubby?” a woman asks, noticing Rory’s ring.

Before Rory can protest, the Doctor flings himself at Rory.

“When in Rome,” the Doctor says near his ear. “I’d rather not be slathered all over by locals, thanks.”

The two of them go in search of more alcohol, the Doctor clinging to Rory’s side. Rory puts his arm around the Doctor’s waist as they sidle up to the bar. The Doctor smiles, lopsided.

Rory orders for them while the Doctor frowns at something over the bartender’s shoulder. Rory tries to see what the Doctor’s seeing, but he just sees a wall with some bottles in front of it. For the first time that night, he begins to wonder whether they haven’t possibly had enough to drink.

“Where to next, Pond?” the Doctor slurs slightly.

Rory moves out of the way as a rather large shadow falls over them.

“How good are you at poker?” he asks.

“Rory, I am the Doctor. I am good at everything,” comes the response.

So, off to the poker tables they go, Rory with a light beer and the Doctor with some sparkly blue thing. Twenty minutes later, they’re $50 000 up. How, Rory hasn’t the foggiest, but he is acutely aware of the varying degrees of hatred on the other players’ faces.

“Doctor, I don’t think these are guys we want to piss off,” he whispers into the Doctor’s ear.

“Fair is fair, Pond. I’m not cheating. I’m just good at reading a game,” the Doctor responds, way too loud for Rory’s liking.

His eyes are on the backs of everyone’s cards. That is, until they aren’t. He follows a large shadow across the room, except it’s only a shadow because it’s moving too fast to be seen any other way than peripherally. Rory thumps him in the side as one of the other players, a muscular man with a large, suspicious moustache, pipes up.

“You lose your gall, pansy?”

“You, sir, are not a very nice man, are you?” the Doctor slurs, his American accent back in place, slamming his hand down on the table.

There’s a collective groan and someone yells, “The little twerp has the game rigged!”

“I most certainly do not!” the Doctor responds. “It’s not my fault you suck. If–”

Rory yanks him off the chair and away from the table. Mr. Suspect-stache follows them a ways and the Doctor clings to Rory for dear life.

“No more gambling. I think we’ve risked our lives enough for one night,” Rory says, feeling sobriety creeping up on him like a chill up his spine.

The Doctor, however, appears to have no such sensations.

“Rory, I’m so sorry,” he says, once they’ve stopped. He puts his hand to Rory’s face. “I was going to win you enough money to buy that red Corvette you like. I’m sorry I always almost manage to get us killed.”

He’s leaning against Rory heavily now, his hand nearer to the back of Rory’s neck than his face. Rory can see the individual hairs of the Doctor’s eyelashes.

“It’s alright, Doctor,” he says. “We’re okay. We’re always okay.”

Their faces are an inch apart and Rory swallows visibly. Something in his head is screaming at him, but he can’t make out what it’s saying.

“D’you reckon we should just go back to the room…?” he asks.

“Preferably,” the Doctor says with… _something_ in his voice.

He pulls his eyes off Rory’s lingeringly, but Rory allows himself to be led upstairs.

Back in the lift, that _something_ feels like a hazy fog in the air. The light in the lift dims to a dark green and in the mirrors surrounding, they have no reflection. The shadows throw all the Doctor’s angles into sharp relief and even Rory looks like a tall, dark stranger. He suddenly misses the suit he had on…earlier today? It feels like a week ago.

The Doctor turns to lean against the glass, staring up at Rory through half-lidded eyes. Rory feels himself drawn closer for some reason – for that something. The Doctor pulls on the front of his shirt and it’s as if his hands reach out for the Doctor’s belt loops automatically. He registers the screaming again, but not only can he still not make it out, he finds he doesn’t really want to.

Their faces are an inch apart again, the green light making everything appear dreamlike.

_Like a dream you’ve had a thousand times._

Where did that come from?

What neither of them know is that they both thought this. They are both thinking and feeling all of this. Rory gets close enough to feel the Doctor’s breath against his lips. Right as he’s about to send the screaming into painful crescendo, the Doctor’s mouth brushing his, a flicker of something catches Rory’s eye behind the Doctor.

A shadow, moving.

As he moves closer, trying to peer over the Doctor’s shoulder, the shadow steps forward, too. A steely glint and the deepest pits of fire.

“ _Praise me_ ,” it says in a voice like torturous death.

Rory screams.

He finds himself pressed against the lift door, but it opens and he goes tumbling to the floor. The Doctor jerks around to see what Rory saw, but the mirror is gone. The green light is gone. The lift is wood-paneled, like it had been earlier. The Doctor shakes his head violently side to side.

“What did you see?” he demands, sober at last.

“I…a _demon_ ,” Rory breathes.

“A demon? Rory, that’s impossible. There’s no such thing,” the Doctor says, helping him up.

Rory notices how quickly the Doctor lets go of him, then. The something turns into castor oil in his stomach, pushing bile up his throat. He refuses to acknowledge that he only feels this way because he feels rejected. This is nonsense.

There is something wrong with this hotel.

“There is something wrong with this hotel,” the Doctor says.

Not for the first time, Rory wonders if the Doctor is telepathic. He sees the Doctor smirk at something and shuts his mind away immediately by thinking of Amy.

The Doctor tramps back into the lift, but Rory hangs back apprehensively.

“Rory, it’s going to be fine. I just need to check something downstairs. I need you to come with me, though, so you can tell me more about what you saw,” the Doctor says, reassuringly.

“But what if it comes back?” Rory says, waveringly. His eyes dart around, taking in every crevice of the lift’s interior, willing it to make sense.

“I would never let anything happen to you. You know that,” responds the Doctor. He has that fiercely protective look on his face – a look singular to the Doctor and a look that never lies.

Rory steps inside.

This time, when the door closes, the light doesn’t change. The wood panels stay wooden and the haziness is gone from the air. It’s as if nothing happened earlier. This, Rory thinks, scares him more.

“So, you said a demon?” the Doctor urges gently.

“Like, a _Minotaur_. I know it sounds ridiculous, but that’s what I saw. It was pitch black and had horns of steel and eyes that look like they contain the depths of hell. Doctor, I have never felt so much fear at once.”

The Doctor pulls him into a hug. This time, he lets himself be reassured. He understands why Amy finds so much comfort with the Doctor. He lulls himself into a false sense of security. Then, they come to him again.

_Praise me._

Those words almost make him scream again. As it is, he jerks slightly in the Doctor’s embrace.

“What is it, Rory? You’re safe now.”

“It… _said_ …something,” Rory manages past the lump in his throat. “It said “praise me”.”

At the mention, those eyes are back. They’re in the wood panel that has once again become a mirror, but they’re also behind Rory’s eyelids. When he opens them, the haze is back. Blessedly, the lift door opens.

“Tell me you felt that,” Rory demands, following the Doctor out of the lift at a jog.

“I felt something, alright. The question is, however… HA!”

Rory nearly keels over in fright. He massages the skin over his heart, hoping to restart it.

“What… was my heart attack for?” he asks, glaring at the back of the Doctor’s tousled head.

“Do you see a door, Pond?”

“Y–”

No. He does not. But there was one when they came down earlier… wasn’t there?

The Doctor whips out his screwdriver again, pointing it at the non-doors that are now just one big glass panel with interspersing curtains. The buzz-whine becomes shriller and shriller until the Doctor drops the screwdriver with a gasp of pain.

“It burnt me!” he cries out, entirely forgetting blending in.

“Well, what could cause it to malfunction this way?” Rory asks.

“Energies not explainable by natural law. It’s messing with the sonic on a frequency it can’t handle. I think we need to track your friend, the demon, down and ask it some questions,” the Doctor says.

He spins on his heel and heads back to the casino. They’re barely in the door when there’s an eruption of noise off to their right.

“MATT! Rory! Where did you gays go?” a girl the Doctor is pretty sure is named Nora calls to them.

She’s hand-in-hand with another girl, who is staring at them peculiarly. There’s also something odd about this girl’s face, but the Doctor can’t quite make out what. He inches closer, transfixed. 

“A drink, sir?” a waitron offers.

The Doctor takes a tumbler of what smells like whiskey off their tray and downs it in one gulp. Rory makes to do the same, but the Doctor smacks his glass out of his hand.

“Trust me,” the Doctor hisses at a frowning Rory.

He fixes his gaze on the girl again. The light in the room slowly desaturates to that frightening green colour from the lift. The girl’s eyes burn, as Rory said, as if they are portals to the depths of hell. He feels it, then: the thrum of a supernatural fear. It cripples him and has him wanting to scream and cry all at once. The girl lets go of Nora’s hand and comes closer.

“No! Stay away from me!” he calls out, but it’s more of a carrying whisper, he’s so scared.

“Matt?” she says in the voices of a thousand burning souls. “Are you okay?”

There’s a vicelike arm around his waist and then he’s being dragged away. The girl sets after them, her face sometimes worried and sometimes adorning horns of steel. She’s cut off by the lift door closing.

“Doctor, can you stand?” Rory asks softly near his ear.

The Doctor finds that he can. He turns to face Rory.

“I know you said not to, but you were so scared. I had to try to help…”

The room is hazier and greener than ever. The Doctor can barely make out Rory and they’re but an inch apart. He wants to reassure his friend, but all he can do is put a hand to the taller man’s chest. He doesn’t think much of the green darkening into pitch black until he realises he can no longer feel his legs.

 

 _How can it be morning in here? Our window is fake_ , the Doctor wonders when he opens his eyes.

“Oh, God,” Rory groans from next to him.

He turns his head to the right.

“Oh, God,” the Doctor echoes.

They made it to the bed somehow. The Doctor has no recollection past passing out in the lift. Somehow, though, their clothes did not. Mental stock take has him relieved to discover he is, at least, wearing underwear. Other than that, however, nothing. Even his socks are missing. It also smells distinctly…

“Oh, God,” he groans again.

“D–”

“No.”

“Bu–”

“ _No_.”

Rory drops his face back into his pillow.

“I was just going to ask if my shorts are on your side of the bed,” comes his muffled voice.

“ _Please_ , tell me you mean your trousers and not your pants,” the Doctor says, pained.

“ _Fucking kill me_ ,” Rory mutters, getting up.

The Doctor hastily averts his eyes just in case, but, thankfully, Rory is wearing pants. They get dressed in absolute silence, handing each other discarded items of clothing to put in their bags. Rory goes to shower first, clothes in a neat pile in his arms. The door closes with a definitive snap.

The Doctor wishes he wasn’t alone. Not after last night. There’s absolutely no doubt as to what they did. The Doctor is humiliated to say he can feel it to be true. He noticed, of course, that Rory seems rather unperturbed by the whole turn of events – as if he expected this to happen.

 _As if he_ wanted _this to happen._

_Are you surprised? You know you wanted it, too._

Okay, where did _that_ come from?

 

When Rory screams bloody murder in the shower, there’s no one to hear him. When he runs into the room, blood streaming from every orifice, there’s no one to see it. When he slips, smacks his head on the window sill and collapses in a pool of his own blood, there’s no one to help. When he lies on the ground, writhing from blood loss – there is no one to tell him it’s all in his head.

 

The Doctor has had just about enough of this. He got dressed without showering and is now going to his TARDIS to see if she can’t help shed some light on the turn of events.

She was parked a little ways up the corridor from their room, but when he snaps his fingers, she doesn’t materialise. He tries the key, but to no avail. He was sure she was here. He spins on the spot, trying the finger snapping and the key. Nothing. Did she leave? Maybe he ought just to get Rory and then the two of them can go in search of the TARDIS together.

He heads back the way he came. He thinks he heads back the way he came. When he gets to where he’s sure their room is, however, there’s a utility cupboard. He immediately turns around. At the opposite end of the corridor, that stretches on far longer than he remembers, he finds nothing. How is this possible? He didn’t change floors.

“RORY?!” he throws caution to the wind.

Nothing, of course. There’s never anything. He feels stupid. He hopes Rory is safe.

_When are they ever safe?_

He shakes his head as he walks.

 

When Rory comes to, it’s under less ideal circumstances. He’s pleased to discover that he did not actually lose that much blood. He’s less pleased, though, to discover himself tied naked to a metal chair and every joint in his body in stiff agony.

“Look, we only brought you to so we could ask you how the fuck you’re doing it,” Nora asks, appearing from out of the shadows.

Her shoulder-length, wispy, blue and purple hair stands out glaringly in contrast with her – and everyone else’s, Rory is beginning to notice, as more shadows become mobile – all-black outfit.

“Doing what, exactly?” he asks. “Also, is there any way I could at least get some pants?”

“There are no garments for the sacrifice in a satanic offering!” Nora’s “girlfriend” says, stepping up beside her.

“How are you impervious to the hotel? How can you see when everyone else can’t? We know you and Matt have been snooping around. We see everything, but that’s because we created this hotel and we keep it going with regular sacrifices. No one has ever been able to do this: see through the veil. Now, tell me how?” Nora demands.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about. Satanism isn’t real – magic…isn’t real,” he retaliates, trying to infuse as much venom into his words as he can muster.

He needs to buy time until the Doctor can find him.

“Bullshit!” the “girlfriend” screams. Rory isn’t quite convinced she isn’t actually a Minotaur. “We know you’ve seen something. You and your husband have both seen him. He spoke to you. How did you snap out of it? Shake it off? No one can do that. Not even us, when it takes over.”

“I’ll bargain: let me and _Matt_ go and we’ll not only tell you, but show you. Deal?” he offers.

“Nice try, cucumber twat-wich. We don’t really need to know. It’s an honour to be his vessel. We’ll just kill you both,” Nora says, a shit-eating grin on her face. “Prepare the altar!”

Since Rory’s head is also strapped in to face forward, he can’t see the altar. What he can see is a projector starting up what appears to be a film. “Girlfriend” comes over with a syringe containing pitch black, tar-like fluid. He knows struggling is futile, so he asks a question instead.

“Will this kill me?”

“No. We need you alive to make the offering. This will just make you more susceptible to his will. I mean, it might not even work on you, given what you’ve been able to see past. We have to do it, though. Rules are what make rituals work,” she says, quite reasonably.

“ _Avalon_! _You’re distracting him_ ,” Nora shrieks at her.

Avalon almost drops the syringe. If there ever was a veil Rory did see through, it’s the relationship between Avalon and Nora. Avalon is terrified. Her outbursts from earlier were fuelled by pure anxiety. She wants to be anywhere but here.

“Avalon, if you help me, Matt and I can save you. We can take you away with us. You just have to help him find me,” Rory whispers, hoping Avalon at his side keeps Nora from seeing him talk.

“They’ll sacrifice me if I let you go. That’s how it works. There used to be over a hundred of us, but every time one of us got soft on one of the sacrifices, we’d be sacrificed in their place. God, if it was just death, I’d take it. Anything to get away from this. They torture you to death. You have to die screaming his praises. It’s fucking awful,” she says, tears in her voice.

“Matt won’t let anything happen to you. Neither will I. You just have to trust us and help him find me. Please, Avalon,” he begs.

She’s quiet for a moment, trying to find a vein. As his arm starts to burn, she whispers in his ear: “You’ll have to hold on, then.”

His head starts to thrum with a hypnotic, painful rhythm. The pain is not unbearable, though, and helps keep him grounded. On the screen, the images he sees seer themselves into his mind. Power, power and more power. Through it all: him. He tries to fight it, but the truth is staring him straight in the face.

“Praise him,” he mutters. “Praise him.”

 

 _Hold on, Rory_ , the Doctor thinks as he runs from floor to floor, trying to find the TARDIS.

He feels like he’s been through this hotel at least ten times and she’s nowhere to be found. Everything feels like it did when he ended up in that parallel universe with Rose and Mickey. Not quite the same, but similar. Something is messing with his head in a big way.

Something vibrates in the inside pocket of his wine-red blazer. It’s the psychic paper. He stops dead in his tracks.

““Praise him”,” the Doctor reads aloud. “Oh, no. No, Rory, no!”

He dashes for the casino, not bothering with the lift, but taking the stairs down, two at a time.

“Matt!” she calls from somewhere above him.

He climbs back up the set of stairs he’s midway down. On the upper landing, something wet hits him square in the face. He tries to rub it off, but only manages to get it all over his hands as well.

“I’m sorry, but we need to be able to communicate,” the female voice says.

He opens his eyes and the green light is back. So are the black haze and the terrible fear. In the doorway leading to one of the floors is a silhouette. He finds himself drawn to it, but holds his ground. He won’t make that mistake again.

“You need to save us, Matt. He said you’d save us both. Please?” she begs.

“Where is he?” the Doctor asks.

She directs him to where they are. Before she leaves, he asks her the most irksome question.

“What are you?”

“Witches. We’re witches and that demon you keep seeing is Satan himself. He’s been making all this possible. Please, Matt, you have to hurry. They’re going to sacrifice Rory.”

He practically flies down the stairs. Only the TARDIS could have gone faster. The run gives him just enough time to recall everything he knows about Satanism. He’s astounded as all hell (the irony is not lost on him) that it’s actually real. He recalls with some anxiety the so-called demon he sent into a black hole that time. It claimed to have been Satan. Maybe Satan truly is an undefeatable force. Classic Christianity and Roman Catholicism do claim that light needs darkness to maintain balance. But how does one stop a horde of witches entirely prepared to kill without killing _them_?

 _You play their game_.

He’s relieved to see a slight, cloaked figure outside the basement door.

 

Inside, they carry Rory to the altar. He’s no longer worriedly curious about his surroundings. He’s no longer curious about anything. He’s seen the truth. Not the light, because light is not the way – darkness is. Oh, praise _him_ indeed!

No. No, this is all wrong. He needs…a doctor. No, THE Doctor. Where is he?

“Doctor? Doctor!” he calls, pain wracking his body into paralysis.

“Listen, the only doctor we got is Shiloh and he isn’t about to help you,” Nora purrs.

“Nora!” Avalon yells from the door. Rory hears her run closer. “He’s onto us, Nora. Matt is coming.”

“Take care of it. You’re a witch, for fuck’s sake. Kill him,” Nora says.

“I wouldn’t be bothering you if I could do it by myself.”

Nora leaves after her, ordering everyone to put the ritual on pause until she comes back.

Rory can’t help the sick sense of dread creeping up on him, then. The Doctor doesn’t have his screwdriver and he just knows that he doesn’t have the TARDIS, either. This is straight-up magic and Rory doesn’t even know if the Doctor and his science and cleverness can fight it. How do you hoodwink magic?

Turning his head is agonising, but he sees two hooded figures make their way back up the stairs to the altar.

“Proceed,” says Avalon.

They strap him down, the stone cold beneath him and his muscles protesting relentlessly. So bad is the pain that he almost doesn’t notice one of his captors losing consciousness right next to him.

The others do, however.

“Now, Avalon!” a familiar voice calls.

She throws her hood back and shrieks in what Rory thinks is Latin and everyone – save for himself, her and the Doctor – is knocked out cold. The Doctor slips off his cloak and throws it over Rory. Avalon snaps her fingers and the straps come loose.

“That’s stupid. Why didn’t they do that in the first place?” Rory says, woozily.

“They don’t have their powers yet,” _that_ voice says.

The Doctor is with his back to her already, but doesn’t turn at the sound of that voice.

“Rory, whatever you do, run. Run and run and run as fast as you can. Here,” the Doctor hands him the TARDIS key. “You do not stop until you’ve found the TARDIS and once you find her, you get out of here. Go get Amy and River and RUN.”

Rory stares feverishly at the Doctor. Then he’s grabbing the Doctor’s jaw between his thumb and forefinger and mashing their mouths together furiously. The Doctor’s one and only coherent thought is that he now knows from whom River inherited her kissing prowess. After a minute infinity, the Doctor pulls away gently.

“Go!” he mouths at the other man.

Rory dashes, pained and wobbling, out of harm’s way, the cloak flapping behind him.

“I never wanted the boy, time lord. I knew you the moment you landed your infernal box in my hotel. You are the ultimate vessel,” supposedly-Satan says.

The green light, the haze, the utter powerlessness threatens to engulf the Doctor again. It’s stronger than ever before. He cannot even count on regeneration to end this, because he has none left and because it might not kill this thing.

No doubt letting his mind go exactly where the demon wants, the Doctor makes a final decision. He holds out his hand to him.

“Then, take me. Let my friend go and take _me_.”

“Praise me,” he breathes.

They grasp hands and at once a scream that can only be described as a soul being ripped from a body fills the air. The Doctor takes the pain and owns it: if he’s dying, at least Rory is safe. At least Amy and River are safe. At least the TARDIS–

Is here.

At first he thinks he imagines the sound, but then he forces his eyes open. The Minotaur materialises and dematerialises as if the TARDIS is being parked around him. But no, it is being parked around _him_. He sees Rory at the controls, throwing levers and flipping switches like he’s done this a million times. He seems to have found a pair of sweatpants, which makes the Doctor grin like a fool.

“Rory, you wonderful, beautiful man!” the Doctor cries as the TARDIS takes off again.

“Don’t thank me yet!” Rory calls as the TARDIS gives an unholy shriek and a section of her console blows out.

The Doctor rushes over to see if there’s anything he can do, but something throws him and Rory across the control room. The green light washes over the TARDIS and the smoke from the console turns black. The howling becomes deafeningly loud. The demon seems to be trying to possess the TARDIS.

 _Big mistake_ , thinks the Doctor.

The howling cuts out instantly as the green light is replaced by pure gold. It sweeps through the room, this golden ghost. It is veined with black, but the veins are shrinking and disappearing as they form. Suddenly, the door opens and the ghost shoots through it. The TARDIS starts falling, dead to the world with the time vortex having left her.

The Doctor feels a hand grabbing for him and turns to pull Rory closer. The two men cling to each other like this is all that’s left, which it very well might be.

“Doctor!” Rory yells. “I’m not sorry!”

“Neither am I, Pond! I’m sure it was the time of my life!” he yells back.

The falling causes them to lose consciousness eventually. Their bodies simply cannot take any more adrenalin. It is a peaceful thing, despite the fear. Like sleep after a particularly taxing graveyard shift.

 

“Doctor.”

The whisper is so dry that the Doctor sits bolt upright.

“We’re not dead,” he says.

“No. Neither is the TARDIS.” Rory’s gleeful face is an inch from his.

This time, it’s the Doctor who closes the gap. Their mouths are hot and fierce on each other, devouring each other’s giddiness and wanting for each other’s bodies. If life is what they’ve been granted, it’s life they must celebrate.

Rory’s hands pull on the Doctor’s shirt. He lets himself be undressed, pulling Rory into his lap. It’s when Rory nips his neck that he groans, digging his nails into Rory’s back.

“Ah! Not so hard. I don’t want Amy asking questions,” he murmurs to the Doctor.

“You’re telling me that wasn’t a hickey?” the Doctor arches his eyebrow and tilts his head towards the scene of the crime.

“Fair.”

Eventually, the kissing loses desperation and becomes slow and intense. Rory constantly moving in the Doctor’s lap is causing the best kind of friction. He breathes in the other man’s ear that they should probably get up. Rory nods fervently.

Making it to the control podium is a feat in itself and so they collectively decide not to push it. Instead, the Doctor pushes Rory back, hands on his thighs. He massages there as he sucks on Rory’s bottom lip. The moans and shivering start at once. He reaches out for the Doctor, pulling him closer by the hips.

“Are you sure you want this, Rory?” the Doctor asks delicately.

“If I have to keep this a secret, I might as well have a secret to keep,” Rory reasons. “And, look, both of us are equally baffled as to where this is coming from, but I don’t want to question it anymore. Please, Doctor?”

The Doctor poises himself and pushes inside. Rory can’t kid himself into thinking it doesn’t hurt, but after the pain he went through today, this is practically bliss. Though, the real bliss comes when the Doctor starts moving.

Their moans become synchronised, as do their thrusts. Rory’s hands are vicelike on the Doctors hips and his teeth are bloody from biting open the Doctor’s lip. The Doctor’s hands leave bruises on Rory’s thighs, unquestionably hand-shaped. His entire body vibrates every time he pushes into Rory. He hasn’t had this in so long, he’d forgotten he even knew how.

It’s not long after Rory’s body wracks with pleasure that the Doctor also finds his release. He could shout, it’s so good. In fact, he does.

 _“Fuck!”_ he calls and hears it echo through the TARDIS. “Oh, God, Rory!”

“Took the words right out my mouth,” Rory speaks against the Doctor’s lips. “This is what I call a secret.”

“I reckon we’d have to keep the whole weekend a secret, wouldn’t you, lover?” the Doctor smirks.

“Absolutely.”

They kiss.

 

“Most boring weekend of my life,” River sighs dramatically, sweeping into the TARDIS in the sexy black thing and a wrap around her waist.

“You got a tan,” the Doctor notices.

“That’s about all I got,” she retorts, but kisses him like she means it.

“What about you two?” Amy asks. “Where did you end up?”

“Hell,” Rory says. “Literal hell. So, we spent the weekend in the TARDIS. The Doctor painted his nails and I learnt how the wardrobe works – hands on.”

He pats at the cut on his head.

“Relaxation is boring,” River decides. “Let’s never do it again.”

“Agreed,” the others say in unison.

 


End file.
